Audio 3:19
Bushwalkers airlifted from Tasmanian bushfire danger

Felicity OgilvieUpdated
Wed 9 Jan 2013, 6:22 PM AEDT

The Tasmanian Parks Service has responded to a bushfire by closing bushwalking tracks and using a helicopter to rescue walkers from a remote mountain range in the state's south west. The fire that's burning near Lake Pedder is out of control and is expected to take weeks to extinguish.

Transcript

SALLY SARA: In Tasmania, the Parks and Wildlife Service has used a helicopter to airlift bushwalkers from a remote mountain range that's under threat from a large bushfire. The fire is burning near Lake Pedder in the state's south-west World Heritage Area.

The Parks Service has closed several walking tracks and says it will take weeks to bring the fire under control.

Adrian Pyrke is the manager of fire operations at the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service, and he's talking to our reporter Felicity Ogilvie.

ADRIAN PYRKE: The fire in the south-west is about 45,000 hectares in size at this stage, that's what it was late this day afternoon. The tracks that are closed include the Western Arthurs, the Eastern Arthurs and the Port Davey Track. All of those tracks are closed at the moment and will be for quite some time.

While we did have a small amount of rain on the fire yesterday and we're expecting more today and maybe even tomorrow, so not a huge amount of rain, and it isn't enough to put the fire out, but it's certainly enough to stop the fire from spreading at the time being.

The fire's only burnt in buttongrass, it hasn't burnt any rainforests or other kinds of forests in the south-west at this stage but what we will end up with is little patches of smouldering peat around the perimeter and when it starts to dry out again these will possibly start flaring up again. Maybe that won't happen for a week but we're still expecting that to happen.

So that's the reason why we will be keeping those tracks closed, probably for several weeks at least.

FELICITY OGILVIE: How hard is it to put out fires that get into the peat there in the south-west. So you're saying the fire's already in the peat?

ADRIAN PYRKE: It is extremely hard work. We can do it but it's very, very labour intensive firefighting and when I say we can do it, it's extremely difficult to do it on a fire of this size. We certainly do it routinely on smaller fires, but a fire with that much edge, we simply don't have enough resources.

FELICITY OGILVIE: Now you've got a lot of walkers still there on the South Coast Track, any idea if that track will be closed?

ADRIAN PYRKE: Certainly not at this stage, we're not expecting that track to be closed in the foreseeable future. Where the fire is is not threatening the South Coast Track.

FELICITY OGILVIE: And I understand you had to airlift walkers out of the Arthurs as you closed that walk. Can you explain just how dramatic that mountain range is and how hard it was to get the walkers out.

ADRIAN PYRKE: It certainly is a very dramatic mountain range. Fortunately it's treeless on top, so landing with a helicopter is relatively straightforward, as long as the wind's not too strong.

And what we did was, we checked all the log books at the starts of the tracks and the carparks to get an idea of how many walkers we had in the area and then systematically flew along the tracks and landed near walkers to advise them that they needed to leave and then picked them up and relocated them.

FELICITY OGILVIE: How many walkers did you airlift out of the Western Arthurs and was it also the Mount Anne Walk?

ADRIAN PYRKE: We haven't relocated any walkers from the Mount Anne Walk I don't think, but all in all there was I think 29 walkers that were relocated.

FELICITY OGILVIE: And what about the iconic Overland Track. I mean we've got you know hundreds of tourists out there at the moment, is that track under threat from fire?

ADRIAN PYRKE: No definitely not. The Overland Track's not under any threat at all and it's certainly open for business.

SALLY SARA: Adrian Pyrke from the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service speaking to Felicity Ogilvie.